


your father's disease

by spikeface



Category: Medea - Euripides, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-03
Updated: 2013-05-03
Packaged: 2017-12-10 06:29:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,434
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/782887
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spikeface/pseuds/spikeface
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A retelling of Euripides’ <i>Medea</i>, for <a href="http://community.livejournal.com/issenterprise/2144.html?thread=373088#t373088">this prompt</a> on the ISS Enterprise Kink Meme.</p>
            </blockquote>





	your father's disease

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [your father's disease](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10326665) by [NewBeginnings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/NewBeginnings/pseuds/NewBeginnings)



> Thanks to [](http://green-postit.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://green-postit.livejournal.com/)**green_postit** for all of her wonderful help.

  
_Oh children, how you were destroyed by your father's disease._ \-- Euripides, _Medea_

**Prologos: The Nurse**

Chapel passed by each bed only long enough to check that her patients were breathing, hearing the click of her heels and the beep of the biobeds as if from a distance. Hours had passed since Kirk’s smirking guard had delivered the test results to Sickbay, along with the message that Joanna would not be joining McCoy for dinner as she’d planned. Chapel remembered McCoy’s familiar scowl as he realized that the test had not been administered by any of his staff, the strange blankness that had followed as realization had set in. He’d immediately shut himself up in his office, and there had been no sound from him since. Chapel had mastered the art of walking in Starfleet’s boots years ago, but she felt ready to topple now, unbalanced by Sickbay’s unnatural silence.

She wished that McCoy had never even thought to breed. That he’d been classified as a moron or sterile, or just born a little uglier, not enough to catch the eye of a Jocelyn or a James. If any of those had happened then she wouldn’t have to keep looking over her shoulder as she did her rounds, waiting in vain for any trace of sound or movement from her boss’s office.

There were only a few patients present, all blessedly hypo’d into unconsciousness. Chapel made sure no one was in immediate danger of dying and then went to McCoy.

He let her in with only a murmur, focused on a holo of his daughter on his desk.

She’d seen him down before -- when he’d limped back from his first time with Kirk, bitten and exhausted, reeking of forced orgasms -- the many instances when he had thrust aside his oaths in order to kill and torture for Kirk and his golden ship -- the one night he had been drunk when she found him and listened to the stuttered story of a father slain.

At all those times McCoy had looked older than his years, the soft skin above his cheekbones wrinkled and his eyebrows frozen in an old man’s distaste. Now McCoy’s face was smooth as glass, all emotion washed away. Only the hypo clutched tight in his hand betrayed him.

She didn’t say anything. McCoy hated pity – for himself, at least.

“It’s healthy,” McCoy said, voice rough as if he had been screaming. “Male, they think, but it’s still too early--” His throat failed him, constricting as he tried to voice the words. Eventually his face twisted in familiar anger, and he spoke more easily: “You were supposed to be watching her.”

“I know.” Guilt gnawed her, a feeling she thought she’d locked away back in the academy. How could she have known what was to happen? Even McCoy hadn’t seemed all that wary when Kirk had seen to Joanna’s placement on the Enterprise. It was an open secret that Kirk had been fucking McCoy for years, and guarded his possessions jealously.

Maybe she should have known when she saw Joanna for the first time, coltish and uncertain in the heels but with a certain way about her. She should have predicted it when she saw the way McCoy shepherded her through the ship: McCoy was a private man, generous only with his complaints and medical expertise, but for Joanna there was always a smile. Chapel had healed McCoy up the next morning enough times to know that he rarely denied Kirk anything, but everyone knew Joanna was McCoy’s child and his alone.

Everyone but Kirk.

She wondered when it would stop making her furious, the depths to which Starfleet’s finest would sink. She hoped the day never came. “I apologize.”

She waited, but he said nothing more. “You should rest. You have the conference with Pike coming up.”

McCoy shrugged. Eventually he said, “I should never have left Earth.”

It was something they all realized sooner or later, up in the black. For Chapel it had happened when she had watched Spock agonize a man and felt her blood run hot. It surprised her that it had taken McCoy so long to regret.

Maybe it shouldn’t have. Under the blustering anger, McCoy lived with an unfathomable trust that there was a limit to his suffering. She had always thought Kirk a savvy enough captain to understand that about him, but apparently he didn’t. Chapel knew, as she watched McCoy stare at the image of his daughter and clutch at his hypo, that he would learn soon.

She closed the door behind her with trembling hands, and wondered what kind of CMO M’Benga would be.

**Episodos: The King**

Kirk had been fucking Bones since he’d become captain, and had known him for a few years before. He had his habits down pat: the way he grunted right before he came, the way he always shaved before he brushed his teeth in the morning, the way he pitched a fit over any change in his routine. When Kirk showed up in Sickbay he was sulking up a storm like clockwork, turned away from the door, his broad shoulders taut.

“You’re gonna be one hot grandpa.’”

Bones jumped, eyes comically wide in surprise before narrowing. Kirk licked his lips.

“ _You._ ” Joanna never looked this pissed off when he came to her. She was beautiful, angry, born to be a Captain’s woman, but there had always been something novel about Bones, something foreign to a Starfleet officer, and she didn’t have it. “How fucking dare you.”

Kirk shook his finger. “Temper, temper.”

“You didn’t even have the balls to tell me, you pathetic asshole.”

“I’m telling you now.” He’d waited until there was something binding in Joanna’s womb, something that Bones wouldn’t be able to refuse. Now he could afford to let Bones bluster all he wanted, since there was nothing he could do about it.

“What happened? My ass no longer does it for you, so you wanted the newer model?”

“Don’t be such a drama queen.”

“She’s just a child.”

“She’s old enough.” Kirk had always liked Bones’ spirit, but he would have to learn eventually that pitching a fit would get him nowhere. “And she’s on my ship, so I can do whatever I want, no matter what my _subordinates_ think. Now sit down and shut the fuck up.”

Bones slammed his ass into the chair like it was an attack. Kirk couldn’t help laughing.

Bones looked mutinous. “You -- you -- I don’t even have fucking words for what you are. You think this is funny?”

“I think it’s hilarious.” He had the whole world dicked, and the sooner Bones saw that, the sooner they could go on with their crazy little family that would someday conquer the world. His son was going to have his leadership skills and Bones’ scowl.

He still wasn’t sure if he wanted blue eyes or hazel more.

He thumbed Bones’ sharp cheekbone, wandered down to his full lower lip. “And I think there’s nothing you can do about it, so you might as well calm down before I decide that next time Joanna and I make a baby you can watch.”

Bones’ lip twisted, telegraphing so hard he might as well have spelled out his attack in neon letters. Kirk had always been able to read him like a PADD. He moved to the side, let Bones get in the swing but not the hit, before shoving him back down into the chair hard enough to make him grunt. He struggled so Kirk slapped him. “Hold still.”

Bones went rigid, his eyes down and nostrils flared. The bones of his face were so delicate, perfect, passed on to his daughter and now, he was sure, to Kirk’s son.

This close, Kirk could see that the skin around his eyes was slightly red and puffy. He sighed. Bones was always so melodramatic. “It’s going to be fine.”

Bones said nothing. Kirk cupped his face gently. “Look at me.”

Bones’ jaw clenched in his hands. “Stop it.”

“Look at me,” he ordered more firmly.

Bones obeyed, and as he looked up Kirk kicked himself. He’d known that Bones would get mad; Bones always got mad, even when it meant punishment, even if it wasn’t something worth getting mad over. It had been the biggest appeal about Joanna, besides the child -- just the thought of how Bones’ face would light up with anger had been enough to get him off.

But he’d forgotten that Bones worried all the time under that hard facade Kirk loved to break so much. It was an unnatural quality in an imperial officer, the thing that had attracted Kirk to him in the first place. If you peeled open most officers you just got more blood and viciousness, but Bones harbored something much softer. Kirk only saw it rarely: when he’d fucked Bones to the point of exhaustion, when he showed up in Sickbay bleeding out, whenever Joanna was around. Kirk had been an idiot not to anticipate it now.

He smiled. “Everything is going to be perfect. You’ll see. Joanna’s going to have the best medical care in Starfleet and the next ruler of the fucking universe is going to be _our_ child.”

Bones didn’t look convinced. Kirk felt his throat ripple as he swallowed.

“I’m not giving you up, Bones. You’re still my first, my favorite. Nothing is going to change except that we’re all going to be one big happy family.”

“A happy...” His face twisted in anger again. “You’re fucking my _daughter_ , you sick fuck. How _dare_ you --”

“I’m not asking you, McCoy.” How could Bones not see it, the way this had played right into their hands? Bones was perfect, everything he’d wanted in a fuck and a CMO, but that didn’t change biological fact. Joanna was a goddamn gift, female and fertile and the spitting image of her father.

And maybe it had been a thrill, knowing that she’d been just as hot for him as he for her. It had been almost too easy to make her fold; she’d told him to fuck off at first, of course, but there had been something in her that had been desperate to piss her father off. Maybe he wished she’d protested a little more at first, had more of the McCoy fight in her. He might tell Bones that she had, later, when all of this had blown over.

Or maybe he wouldn’t mention it; it was something she’d never tell Bones herself, a piece of her he’d never have. McCoy deserved that, after, “You were the one who said I’d have to find a kid of my own, anyway.”

It had been years ago, granted, before they’d settled into what they had now. But he still remembered McCoy’s tight smile, his absolute certainty that Kirk would never have his daughter. McCoy was always doing that -- daring him to new heights, to go ever more boldly. It was how they worked. “You caused all of this.”

“No.” Bones shoved him hard but Kirk pressed back harder, taking his wrists again so Bones would understand that enough was enough. “It’s done, McCoy.”

He waited until finally Bones nodded, stone-faced but capitulant. Kirk felt the usual rush of triumph and arousal, and moved to kiss Bones forcefully. Bones tensed, mouth pursed, and then slowly melted into the kiss in that way that always drove Kirk wild. Joanna couldn’t kiss like this.

But then Bones jerked away, panting. “I can’t.”

“Yes, you can.” This was the game they’d played since Kirk had become captain. Bones always had to be forced into realizing his true potential, a job Kirk had taken to with delight.

Bones’ mouth twisted, his hands working uselessly against Kirk’s grip. Kirk braced himself, wondering if Bones was aiming to throw another punch.

Then Bones looked up.

His eyes were wide and soulful, his lips worried under his teeth just so. It was a look his daughter was working on, but Kirk was sure no one would ever match him for pure fuckable vulnerability. He leaned up and kissed Kirk and it was perfect, a heady mix of pleading and submission that always hit like a drug after all the anger and resistance.

“You have until after the meeting with Pike.” He supposed he could afford a little generosity, now that he had won. Bones would come around.

McCoy looked up at him from under his lashes. “That should do it.”

Kirk left smiling.

**Episodos: The Visitor**

The meeting with Kirk had gone as expected. He and Pike had both beamed down to Izzar III with a sizable entourage, quibbled over protocol and paperwork and glory, and left with the usual agreement that Kirk would do whatever Pike said and keep all the fame for himself. If it stung Pike to stare up at his brilliant bastard of a protégé and pretend this was how he had planned his life, it was still an arrangement that had suited them ever since Pike had made admiral.

But it wasn’t why he was here.

The real reason was sitting in his hotel room in Izzar III’s capital, twiddling a hypo. With any other man Pike would have suspected poison, but McCoy wasn’t that kind of doctor. “Captain Kirk said you wanted to see me, sir.”

“I need a favor.”

“Shouldn’t you be asking Jim about that?”

Pike couldn’t stand generosity. He’d had his fill of it after Narada, once everyone had gotten over the shock of him losing the captaincy but keeping his life. Every politician and his sister had come crawling up to kiss his ass, apparently undeterred by the fact that it was welded to a wheelchair. That had been annoying, but just a variation on a theme. It had been the doctors and nurses that had driven him mad, touching and probing and even genuinely pitying.

There had been one man more than the others, the one who had saved his life: McCoy, the miracle-worker, the witch doctor, the man with the magic hands. He was the reason Pike was still alive, such as it was.

He was his last damned hope. “It’s a medical issue.”

“They don’t have doctors back on Earth?”

“I’ve seen other doctors.” Too many of them, incompetent and contradictory, spouting advice that read like nonsense for fear of offending an admiral. Only McCoy had ever looked him in the eye, unafraid as he told Pike he’d never walk again.

“So what is it?”

“I want to have children.”

McCoy, one of the most animated men he’d ever met, went completely still.

Pike took his file from his pocket, handed it over. McCoy pocketed the hypo and studied the PADD as Pike repeated the speech he’d memorized so his words wouldn’t falter: “My former first lieutenant and I are trying to conceive. We’re having difficulty because of my spinal injuries. I want to know if it’s possible to do something about it.”

McCoy stared at the PADD for a long time. Finally he looked up.

He didn’t look like a man taking pity, but that was his gift. Pike knew, like every miserable bastard who’d been his patient at one point or another, that McCoy’s anger was a flimsy shield for his concern, one he dropped at the operating table.

“I can help you with that.”

Pike nodded, gritting his teeth against the burn of being offered help from this man.

“But I want something in return.”

Pike blinked, but as realization sunk in he relaxed minimally. It was a relief, in a way, to have to bargain for it. He had made his career on bargains, and not even the Romulans had been able to take that away from him. “I could be amenable.”

“I want to work for you.”

That was unexpected. “You work for Kirk.”

“I’m leaving him.”

The abruptness of it shocked him silent for a moment. He had no doubt that Kirk was an insufferable bastard; the fierce drive that made him such a formidable captain was probably hell to deal with on a personal level. But Kirk and McCoy had been a matched pair for years. It had been McCoy who had brought Kirk onto the _Enterprise_ in the first place. “I was under the impression that you two had an arrangement.”

“He impregnated my daughter.” McCoy’s voice went rough, his grip on the PADD so tight Pike thought it might break.

He tried to cover his shock with thoughtfulness: “I see.”

He’d always thought Kirk was smarter than that.

He could understand the temptation, of course. Starfleet was filled with people who needed breaking, more who liked to break things. McCoy was firmly in the former, with his pretty face, foul mouth and damnable compassion. Kirk was notoriously the latter, like any ambitious officer, but there were some places even a Starfleet captain shouldn’t boldly go. And Pike knew, like any man that wanted to be a father, that McCoy’s child would be one of them.

It was a mistake. And if Kirk could make one of this magnitude, he would make more.

McCoy might have mistaken his silence for refusal: “Your file indicates that you need regular medical attention, and I’m sure if your wife is in the service she’ll want someone who is discreet.”

“You any good at delivering children?”

McCoy’s lips quirked. “So I’ve been told.”

“What does Kirk have to say about it?”

“He doesn’t know, but he won’t be happy.”

Pike considered the implications. Kirk was one of Starfleet’s favorites, and Pike knew he wouldn’t let an heir go easily. Pike found he didn’t care. It would be a pain in the ass, but a small price to pay for knowing that Kirk would be left on the planet, staring up at the man who’d taken everything from him with a fucking smile on his face. Kirk could try that on for size, see how he liked it.

He held out his hand. “All right, then. We have a deal.”

McCoy shook his hand, but asked, “How do I know you’ll keep your promise?”

Pike had no intention of breaking it. The thought of never having to deal with another moron of a doctor, having his wife and child cared for by the best, and sticking it to Kirk at the same time was far too good to pass up. But he respected a man with the sense to take precautions. “I’m a man of my word, but you can keep that.” He nodded at the PADD. “You could ruin me with it.”

McCoy considered it again like he’d been told it was a bomb, so charmingly guileless that Pike almost smiled. “Okay.”

“I’ll be returning to the _Helios_ in an hour, and we leave in four. When should I tell Engineering to expect you?”

“Three hours.” McCoy smiled faintly. “I just have to say goodbye.”

He left.

**Episodos: The Wife**

Joanna had been afraid that he would be gone by the time she got a chance to talk to him. She’d thought she’d have to hunt him down, beg to see him.

But he comm’d her a few hours after the conference was over, and when she found him in the hotel room he seemed calm. Only his silence betrayed his nerves, the way he stared at her like she was something unrecognizable. She hated it, wanted to hate him for it, hated more that she had made things this way. Her fury made her throat close and her tongue numb, so she could only stand awkwardly, just past the threshold, while they stared at each other.

He broke the silence: “How are you feeling?”

“That my father or my doctor asking?”

“Joanna.”

“Because I can’t really tell, anymore.”

“Joanna, stop it.”

“A little late for that, don’t you think?”

“I don’t want to fight.”

“Why don’t you just leave, then, like you always do?”

He flinched, and she clapped her hands over her mouth, as if there were anything else to keep inside. But that had been the only thing in her for years, festering until she couldn’t stand it anymore, until she’d done the stupidest thing she could to put something else inside her. And now that it was out it felt small, childish, because anyone could see it wasn’t true.

But her father didn’t look mad. “It’s all right to be angry. It’s what makes us human.”

And she had been angry, she wanted to say. She’d been mad enough to spit when Kirk first started leering at her. But that meant explaining how the anger had changed into something else. She’d told herself that she’d been doing it to keep Kirk tied to them, because everyone knew about Kirk and McCoy, everyone wondered when Kirk would give him up to settle down with something female and fertile, and now nobody would have to wonder anymore.

She just had to get Kirk and her dad to realize it. Her dad would understand, she was sure, as soon as she found the words. He wasn’t going to leave, so she had all the time in the world to convince him. And Kirk already knew, from the way he never touched her anymore, the way he never looked at her face.

Her mother had done the same thing. “ _You look just like him_ ,” she’d said, inspecting her nails as she tanned in the Georgia sun. “ _And I’m sure you’ll be just as much trouble._ ”

“Everything is going to be fine,” she said, furious that she couldn’t keep the tremor out of her voice.

“I know.” His mouth twisted like he was going to cry.

“It’ll be all right.” She knew she sounded young, but she was right. Everyone was angry now but that couldn’t last forever. Kirk loved her father, she knew that, and she loved him too, and her father loved her, and Kirk would love the baby and so would she and so would her dad. “Kirk’s not going to leave us now, not with the child, and --”

“You can’t keep it,” he said, looking so tired that she threw her arms around him.

He held her too tight; most people were afraid of her father’s hypos, of his red-faced snarling, but it was his love that always hurt. When she’d been little she’d thought he’d left because he didn’t love her. Only later, when she’d seen what exactly Kirk was and what her daddy dealt with every day, did she realize the truth. His pain was obvious, written into his every expression, so she smiled and hugged him back and didn’t say anything. She could shoulder this for him.

“He’ll use it against you forever,” he said into her neck. “You’ll never be free of him.”

“Daddy, I’ve made up my mind.”

But he didn’t stop. “You have to do it. There’s no other way. You have to do it.”

“It’s done, Daddy. Everything is going to work out.”

She jumped as heat splashed against her shoulder, hugged him tighter as she realized what it meant. He gripped her harder in return, too tight around her ribs. She held her breath, trying to give him as long as possible.

“I love you so much,” he said, sounding like he’d been screaming.

“Let go.”

He made a noise against her shoulder, anguished and nearly inhuman.

“Daddy, please.”

He held on.

**Exodos: The Foreigner**

There was no humanity in anger. He knew that now, staring at his dead child and feeling a curious blank where his rage had been. It was an unfamiliar peace, something renewed in him, like he’d shed an old skin.

She might have been sleeping, her expression peaceful. His beautiful baby girl. There had been a strong sedative along with the poison, and years of practice had let him hit right in the vein. She’d gone under before she could so much as frown. It had only hurt a little, as she’d shivered and gone still.

She felt weightless in his arms now, as if her dying had given him more than mere mortal strength. His old concerns seemed unimportant, although he knew there was one more to deal with, one more tie to sever before he could fly away.

As if called, Jim pounded on the door. “Open up, Bones.”

It was the same order he’d given on the first night he’d been captain. He remembered that night, how furious and betrayed he’d felt, how he’d given in so pathetically easy.

“Come on. If you’re going to scowl at me I want to watch.”

That was over now.

“Now, Bones. That’s an order from your captain.”

Jim was not his captain anymore.

“Open the door.”

He’d known it would only be a matter of time before Jim found out about the poison, or that he’d asked to see Joanna, or even that he’d talked to Pike. He had taken precautions; he didn’t want his pain and rage rolled out for everyone to see.

“McCoy!”

Amazing what a locked door could do outside of the Enterprise. McCoy had long ago gotten used to Jim barging in whenever he felt like it, courtesy of the captain’s override and his unending sense of entitlement. “It’s no use.”

“What are you doing?”

He stared down at Joanna’s smooth face, at her stomach where -- “It’s already done.”

“Bones.” Jim’s voice had gone soft, the way it did when he was truly angry. McCoy had felt the brunt of it on occasion, had watched others suffer it more often as he’d stood by, helpless and furious.

A laugh stumbled out of him. “Temper, temper.”

“Where’s Joanna?” He could barely hear Jim through the door.

She was safe. She was his. But it was Jim asking, so he only said, “Gone.”

Jim was silent. McCoy wished he could see Jim’s expression now, but he took solace in the fact that there was no laughter. He hoped Jim never so much as smiled again.

“Let me in,” Jim said eventually, all but muted.

His last triumph: “Never.”

Jim bellowed, a raging, bestial sound. If he’d been a dog McCoy would have shot him like any man of mercy. But he was a Starfleet Captain, so McCoy only smiled. He hoped Jim lived to be a hundred and fifty, hoped he died from a wound any doctor worth his salt could fix. He shifted his beautiful girl in his arms until he could speak into his communicator. “McCoy to _Helios_. Two to beam up.”

He saw the lights swirl about him, and felt himself begin to rise.  



End file.
